MEASURING MOBILE INTERNET

Michael.Minges@itu.intTelecommunication Development Bureau

Opinions expressed may not reflect the views of the International Telecommunication Union or it members

Pacific Telecommunication Council2004 Conference

Honolulu, USA 11-14 January 2004

Contents• Introduction• Advanced Asia-Pacific

Economies Overview• Indicators

– Usage– Users– Infrastructure– Pricing– Revenue

• Index• Recommendations

Some of the data is estimated or from 3rd parties.

When data only available for one operator, it is used as a proxy for

entire economy.

Why measure?

• Mobile has passed fixed & Internet use growing– A logical marriage?

• Non-voice mobile use growing

• Commercial / regulatory / social / analytical implications

0

500

1'000

1'500

1982 88 94 2000

World telephone subscribers,

millions

Fixed Mobile

1'330

1'210

0

200

400

600

800

1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002

World Internet users, millions

Source: ITU.

3G licensesCountry Licenses Method Date

awardedAmount

(US$ m) ~Australia 6 Auction (regional) Mar-01 579

Hong Kong, China 4 Auction (pre-qualify) Sep-01 128*

Japan 3 Beauty contest Jun-00 Free

Korea (Rep.) 3 Beauty contest Aug-01 2’886

New Zealand 4 Auction (regional) Jan-01 60

Singapore 3 Auction (Cancelled)# Apr-01 165

Taiwan, China 5 Auction Feb-02 1’399

Note: ~ Total amount received for all licenses. Local currency converted at rate at date of license award. * Amount bid was HK$ 4.1 (US$ 0.5) million. In addition, licensees must pay minimum of HK$ 50 million per year or 5% of turnover. Amount shown reflects first five years. # Only one offer was made for each 3G spectrum right so licenses awarded to three bidders.

What is Mobile Internet?

Browsing Internet from a mobile…

…or accessing Internet from a mobile network…

…or WiFi?

Overview of advanced Asia-Pacific mobile markets

• Mature– Taiwan, China first economy in world to have more

mobiles than people!

CDMA30%

GSM31%

PDC39%

Mobile cellular subscribers by

technology, advanced Asia-

Pacifc, 2002

Total = 155 million

89106

7868

5862

6768

JapanNew Zealand

AverageKorea (Rep.)

AustraliaSingaporeHK, China

Taiwan, China

Mobile subscribers

per 100 inhabitants,

2002• Mixture of technologies• Trendsetters in mobile

data:– Korea (Rep.) launched

world’s first CDMA2000 1x 3G network in October 2000

– Japan launched world’s first W-CDMA 3G network in October 2001 Source: ITU.

Text messaging

• Not mobile Internet• Most intensely used

non-voice mobile application

• Possible indicator of potential mobile Internet use– Number of messages– Penetration (i.e., % of

subscribers that use it)• Wide variation in region

– Definitions? (e.g., sent & received, ‘junk’ SMS, etc.)

4

7

17

24

111

167

184

HongKong,China

Taiwan,China

Australia

NewZealand

Japan

Korea(Rep.)

Singapore

SMS per subscriber per

month,2002

Note: SMS = Short Message ServiceSource: ITU adapted from various reports.

Traffic: Minutes or Packets?

• Measure in two ways:– Time (minutes of

use)– Volume (kilobytes)

• Few operators publish this data

9 11

148

0

50100

150

200

A M J J A S O N D

Voice

Data

25262728293031

A M J J A S O N D

DoCoMo (Japan), i-mode, KB/day/sub

Note: 2002. Data MOU is average connection to wireless data network regardless of charging system, time-based or packet-based. Source: KTF, DoCoMo.

KTF (Korea, Rep.), Avg. monthly minutes of use (MOU), 2002

Mobile phone Internet subscribersSubscribers browsing the Internet from their

mobile phone (e.g., Wireless Access Protocol (WAP), i-mode)

16.2%

78.7%

29.0%

44.1%

40.0%

32.3%

Subscribingto mobileInternet

UsingmobileInternet

Accessingpaid

content

JapanKorea (Rep.)

As % of total mobile

subscribers, August 2002

Source: ITU adapted from Nomura Research Institute & Korea Network Information Center

81.0%

45.0%

7.4%

4.8%

2.9%

1.4%

1.2%

Japan

Korea(Rep.)

Singapore

Australia

Taiwan,China

NewZealand

HK, China

Mobile phone Internet

subscribers as % of total

mobile subscribers,

2002

Source: ITU adapted from various sources

What is an Internet user?

55.2

54.0

48.4

44.9

43.1

42.7

38.3

9.6

0 20 40 60

Korea(Rep.)

Singapore

NewZealand

Japan

HK, China

Australia

Taiwan,China

Internet users per 100 inhabitants, 2002

PC and mobile phone43%

PC only35%

Mobile phone only22%

Internet access usage method, Japan, 2002

Source: ITU adapted from Nomura Research Institute.Source: ITU.

Mobile phone only

High-speed mobile(e.g., GPRS, CDMA2000 1x, W-CDMA)

• Infrastructure indicator– Subscribers to high-speed

mobile data services– Coverage of high-speed

mobile Internet network• Comparability issues

– Not all high-speed networks same (GPRS, CDMA2000 1x, CDMA2000 1x EV/DO, W-CDMA)

– Some operators count handsets rather than subscribers

– A subscriber may not be using high-speed features

– Subscribers may be pay as you go 9.6

28.8

64

114

144

384

2000

2400

GSM/PDC

PDC-P

CDMA

GPRS

CDMA1xRTT

W-CDMAmoving

W-CDMAstationary

CDMA1xEV/DO

Theoretical data

transmission speedkbps

Source: ITU.

31%/38%

12%

18%

0.4%

High-speed mobileSubscribers & Coverage

10097

90

60

22 26

75

93

99

100

9997

22

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Years after the launch of service

FOMA outdoor coveragePDC outdoor coverage

PDC service launch

Mar. 1993

FOMA launch

Oct. 2001

51.1%

6.6%

6.4%

2.7%

2.3%

1.6%

0.3%

Korea(Rep.)

Japan

Singapore

HK, China

NewZealand

Taiwan,China

Australia

High-speed Internet

subscribers as % of total mobile

subscribers, 2002

Source: ITU adapted from DoCoMo.Source: ITU adapted from various sources.

Mobile data revenue• Most popular metric

among operators with almost all publishing

• True mobile Internet use is often not separated from message revenues

• May reflect high prices rather than intensity of use

• Two basic indicators:– Mobile data revenue as %

of total mobile revenue– Average Mobile Data

Revenue Per User (ARPU)

19.3%

13.0%

10.6%

10.0%

5.0%

2.9%

2.5%

Japan

Singapore

Korea(Rep.)

Australia

NewZealand

Taiwan,China

HK, China

Mobile data service as per cent of total

mobile revenue, 2002

Source: ITU adapted from various sources.

Mobile pricing

• Two ways of pricing:– Time (length of

period logged on). Generally used for low-speed access.

– Volume (amount of data transferred). Generally used for high-speed access.

• Can also have a subscription plan or “pay as you go”. $3.60

$5.23

$7.69

$8.07

$8.52

$13.19

Korea(Rep.)

Singapore

HK, China

Australia

Taiwan,China

NewZealand

One hour of WAP, circuit

switch access, US$,

2003

Source: ITU adapted from various sources.

High-speed mobile pricing

1 Megabyte (MB) is approximately equivalent to: – 250 emails

(of 200 words) – 20 emails with

attachments – 20 pages of

spreadsheets – 10 web pages

Source: Telstra $2.32

$3.70

$3.90

$5.78

$10.87

$12.46

$12.82

Singapore

NewZealand

Korea(Rep.)

Taiwan,China

Australia

Japan

HongKong,China

High-speed mobile Internet pricing, per MB,

US$, 2003

Source: ITU adapted from various sources.

Mobile Internet Index• Which economy is doing

best overall in mobile Internet?

• Helps to overcome limitations of different data by using a number of variables

• Indicators:– Mobile to Internet Ratio– SMS/sub/month– Mobile telephone Internet

users ratio– High-speed mobile subscriber

ratio– Mobile data revenue ratio

• Mobile Internet Divide

9

12

13

24

25

27

30

Korea(Rep.)

Singapore

Japan

NewZealand

Australia

HK, China

Taiwan,China

Mobile Internet ranking

Total score(Lower = Better)

Source: ITU.

Mobile Internet building blocks

Mobile Internet

user

Internet enabled cell phone(WAP/GPRS-CDMA2000 1x)

Coverage of high-speed network

Mobile subscriber

Mobilesubscriber

User

Internet-enabledphone

High-speed mobile network coverage

Mobile Internet Data availability

SMS Traffic Subscribers Infra-structure

Revenue Pricing Surveys

AUS HKG JPN KOR NZL SGP TWN Generally available at economy level (from telecom regulator) Available from at least one operator No primary data available. Estimated or secondary source.

Recommendations

• Agreement on standard list of mobile Internet indicators and definitions

• Government ICT agencies need to collect and disseminate the data (only Hong Kong, China and Taiwan, China publish limited mobile Internet statistics)

• National statistical offices should incorporate mobile Internet questions into ICT surveys

• If mobile is important, then why not PDAs and notebooks? If wireless important, then why not 802.11? So should WiFi also be included as a mobile Internet indicator (e.g., number of users, number of hotspots)?